And Then There Were None
by I He She
Summary: This is a tale of people who have lost everything. Of people who try to get their lives back. Of people who seek revenge. Of people who seek comfort. Of people who no one will remember. This is a tale of despair. This is a tale of failure.
1. Red-Eyed Demon, Red-Haired Swordsman

**Red-Eyed Demon, Red-Haired Swordsman**

They looked through the whole cave, but with no results. They were two. One of them was a young boy, with crimson eyes and red, quite long, spiky hair tied up in a ponytail. The lower part of his body was protected by a steely armor, under which he wore black pants. The upper part of his body was covered by a red shirt with black, long sleeves. On his left wrist was a metal brecelet which extended on the outer part of the arm, almost to his elbow. On his back he carried a great sword, whose blade was made of three parts.

He noticed a small tunnel he didn't saw before. He walked over to it. Lighting it with his torch, he got the impression it was quite deep, and the echo which followed his words convinced him more about it.

"Amelia! Maybe I've found it!"

"Roger!" a female voice answered.

A woman walked over to him. She had neck-long, blonde hair, on which she wore a golden, jeweled tiara. Her hands, her shoulders and her strip navel were bare, but the rest of her body was covered. She wore black, knee-high boots, a pair of white pants, a bra-like white shirt and two white sleeves kept on by a pair of leather straps. She was holding an apparently wood-made bow. Her eyes were an extremely dark shade of yellow. Also, she had very long ears, like no human could ever have.

She looked at the tunnel for a moment.

"Good job, Elsword" she said while patting the boy's head. He covered himself with his arm to prevent her hand from reaching him.

"Quit that. I'm not a child"

"Oh, you are"

"I'm fifteen, dammit!"

"That's not even a twentieth of my age" she mocked him.

"Oh, just shut up, Amelia."

She laughed softly.

"Ok, shall we go?"

"Sure"

They headed down the gallery, with Amelia ahead of Elsword. They walked for less than five minutes before they reached a dead-end.

"So, nothing here, uh?"

"Wait"

The elf probed the rock with her hand for a while, until she found something. She pushed, and a small push-button clicked. The stone in front of them moved to the side.

"How did you know that?"

"Just a feeling. You know, treasure hunters's stuff"

"Yeah, yeah"

They walked for five more minutes, until they reached a wooden door.

"Found them" hummed Amelia.

She slowly opened the door. They found themselves inside a quite large cave. Inside there were seven armed men, and a pair of chests. Judging by their look, they were probably bandits. The ones they were after. Elsword rushed in for their boss, a tall and large man with a scarred eye, a weird necklace and a sword almost as big as himself. Despite being taken by surprise, he managed to avoid Elsword's first strike and drew his sword.

"You damn brat!"

He stroke with all his mighty, but Elsword blocked the attack with his sword and another one, red and white, he pulled out from a sheath which had appeared for a brief moment out of nothing.

"So it's you again, Banthus! I thought you were in jail"

They exchanged a few blows, then Elsword blocked the bandit's sword with one of his and sent it flying with a blow from the other. Banthus, now disarmed, shouted and tried to deliver a fist to the young boy's face, but his arm was severed. There was no blood. It was an artificial limb. Elsword knew that. After all, the one who severed Banthus's real arm, years ago, was his sister. He hit the bandit on the head with the hilts of both his sword, causing him to fall unconscious. When he turned, Amelia had already finished dealing with the other bandits, who were all on the ground, unconscious like their leader.

"Quite disappointing" said Elsword while letting go the white-red sword, which disappeared into the air, and putting the other one on his back.

"What?" asked the elf.

"This guy. I thought he could at least put up a fight, but nothing"

"I can be your sparring partner, if you want"

"This is going from an extreme to the another..."

The lef giggled.

"Anyway..."

They opened the chest.

"... just some money, and... hey, they have a few jewels inside here. Maybe you're interested in them" said Elsword.

"Found it!" hummed Amelia while taking a large, cristal-like, blue stone out of the second chest "The Eldrit they stole from your village, right?"

"Yeah, it's that. No doubts about it"

"Perfect. Now let me see what's there"

She walked over to the other chest and looked inside it. There weren't that much money, and the jewels all looked quite crappy, at least for her.

"Nothing particular, I would say. What a shame"

"What do we do with them?" asked Elsword.

"We're near Elder, right? Why don't we just tell the guards there about these guys?"

"Yeah, you're right"

They left, bringing the Eldrit with them and blocking somehow the secret door from the outside. After telling the guards of Elder about the bandits's location, they began to walk back to Ruben. It was along the way that Elsword began to talk.

"It's been almost five years since my sister left the village..."

Amelia looked at him.

"Do you want to leave the village too?"

"As if I could. I know you'll resume your journey soon, and if I leave, there would be noone left to protect Hagus, Anne and the others"

"There's still Lowe"

"Well... not to talk bad about him, but he has never been that strong... and he can't even wield his sword properly ever since he badly injured his arm's bones one year ago. I mean, it's not like he can't deal with bandits now and then, but..."

"Well, you're right"

The old, but young-looking, elf looked at the red-haired boy. He would never admit it, but the truth was he was worried about his sister. She used to send them some letters, usually one every two or three months, but it had already been two years since the last one arrived. Elsword wanted to go look for her, but he couldn't. Amelia was there, that was true, but she was a wandering treasure hunter, and he didn't feel right with leaving someone who is living there only on a temporary whim to protect the place.

After two days, they had almost reached Ruben. The sun had almost set, and they were walking on the road when Amelia stopped Elsword.

"Wait"

Her ears moved a bit, and she smelled the air.

"... I have a bad feeling. We should hurry"

They accelerated the pace, until they reached the village. All the lanterns were extinguished, and there was a weird silence upon the whole place. Not even the crickets could be heard, which was not normal.

Elsword was just about to call out for someone when Amelia silenced him.

"There's something wrong here"

They both took out their weapons, and walked through the empty roads. However, with the sun almost completely set and with no lantern lit, Elsword couldn't see much. They went at Anne's house. When they arrived there, they found the door smashed. No, cut. It had been completely sliced. Elsword took a lantern and lit it, then they entered the small, wooden house.

Just as they walked in, a terrible stink reached the young boy's nose. Amelia felt it even from outside, but told nothing because she hoped she was wrong. She wasn't.

They found her. Rather, they found what was left of her corpse. A gruesome, almost surreal sight. She had been tore in two, and almost all her flesh was gone, leaving most of her bones almost bare. There were a few parts of her organs scattered around the room, but there wasn't as much blood as there should have been. Her head had been torn off and left on the ground.

Elsword almost screamed at that sight, but his throwing up prevented him from doing so. Amelia looked at what was in front of her. There were a few bloody footprints going from the corpse, if it could still be called that way, to one of the windows.

"Who... who could have done this... are the others...?" muttered Elsword.

"It's still around here"

"What?"

"Whatever did this to Anne, and probably to everyone else, is still here. Also, I would say it's watching us"

Elsword took out his second sword from the sheat, which appeared and disappeared just like in the cave, and looked into the darkness. He was trembling. Despite his age, he had already faced many dangers, but this... this was different. It was all... surreal. Suddenly, with no notice, everyone in his village was dead, killed in an horrible way. And whatever did that was still there, and was now waiting the right moment to strike.

Amelia, however, was just as tense as Elsword. She had travelled for more than an hundred years, and she had experienced things normal humans could hardly even imagine. Because of this, she could recognize a demon's doing. She was sweating slightly, her bow ready, scanning the area around them.

"... should we go out?" asked Elsword.

She thought about it for a moment. Staying out, they could be attacked from every direction. Still, looking at how the door had been destroyed, those wooden walls couldn't be considered a solid defense. Also, outside she would have a better line of fire.

"Yes. I'll walk out, watching the outside. Stay right behind me, and look the other side, in case it gets into the house again"

Elsword nodded. They began to move, slowly. They stopped every time they heard something. When they got out, the sun had completely set. It was night. Elsword couldn't tell if they had been there for five minutes or for three hours, when he saw something. Two red, animal eyes, in the darkness. They weren't far. And they were staring at him. He flicked Amelia with his elbow. The elf looked over her shoulder. The young boy could only see two eyes, but the elf was able to see much better than him. In front of them was... a girl. A beautiful girl, dressed in white and dyed in crimson, with long, silvery hair and... nine silver-plated, almost shining tails. Her fangs were longer than those of humans, as well as her fingernails, which looked like claws. She was holding a long spear, on whose blade were still hanging some fresh organs.

_What... what is she?_

"Step back, Elsword. You can't handle this"

The red-haired knight obeyed. Amelia faced the tailed girl. In response, she grabbed one of the organs from her spear and brought it to her mouth. She bit it. Amelia was happy Elsword couldn't see it.

She pointed her bow at her, waiting. Then, something happened. A noise. A squeaky door being opened. The girl istantly ran over to the sound, ad blinding speed. Amelia shoot more than a dozen of arrows in less than a second, but none of them hit their target. She tried to catch up to the girl, and Elsword followed her as he could. But they both lost sight of her. Then, a scream. They rushed over to it. What they found was Lowe, completely tore apart, and a black-haired girl, unconcious on the ground, in a pool of blood.

Elsword closed in, enough to see her. He realized what happened was that girl's doing, and rised his swords to hit her, but Amelia stopped him.

"Wait. I've seen something like this before" she told him before he could say anything, while bending down near the girl "She is... possessed by some demon, I think"

"And so?"

"Don't kill her"

"Wha... are you kidding me?!"

"I'm just being rational. If you try to kill her, the demon who did all this will probably come out to protect his host. Besides, there are a few things I want to ask her when she wakes up"

"..."

Elsword walked away, probably to prevent himself from hitting Amelia of that girl. The whole thing was still... just unbeliavable. Everything was normal. Then... everything disappeared. With just no reason.

"... Damn it!"

He slammed his swords into a three with all his mighty.

"... damn it... damn..."

He looked far away, to the horizon.

"Sister... at least you... you are still there, right?"

* * *

**Author's notes**

**Well, first chapter is finished. I've just a few things to say. First, there will be at least one original class (for Elesis, since she still has no official second jobs). A lot of (probably all) the epic NPCs will apppear.**

**Also, I tagged it only as "Ara", "Eve" and "Raven", but the story will revolve also around Elsword, Chung, Aisha, Elesis and Rena. Sometimes probably even around one of the epic NPCs.**

**Last thing. The "Adventure" tag may get switched with Angst, because I'm not sure which one of the two will be more preponderant. That, and I'm not sure about how to write and angst.**

**I hope you liked this chapter.**


	2. Leaving

**Leaving**

When she woke up, she was in a bed, in the middle of a wooden, half-destroyed room. Light came in from the window. The sun was high in the sky, but it looked like it was going to rain soon. Her spear was gone, as well as her clothes, and so she was wearing only her undergarments. That left her quite confused. She got up. There was a mirror in the room, so she took a look at herself. That was when she noticed. There was blood here and there on her body, mainly around her mouth and on her hands. She fell to her knees.

"Again... it happened... again..."

"Oh, so you woke up" someone said.

The girl turned. Standing on the door, with her clothes in hand, was a woman. An elf, with blonde hair and dark yellow eyes.

"I..."

The woman handed her the clothes.

"There are a few things I'd like to ask you"

"... sure, but..."

"Is there something you want to know?"

"... where are we?" asked the girl while putting on her clothes. They were a bit wet.

"This is... was a small village called Ruben, quite close to Elder"

"The inhabitants are...?"

"Dead. All but one who wasn't here. Now he's burying them. He's having some trouble with the tombstones, since some on the corpses are unrecognizable. As for me, I was... just someone who was spending some time here"

The girl looked down, with a mixture of guilt, fear and uncertainty in her eyes.

"Who are you? I've never seen clothes like that before, and though I'm not an expert when it comes to demons, I've never heard about one with nine silvery tails"

"I... my name is Ara Haan. I was born in Fahrmann, where the Gods reside, in the village of Isshin. The one you saw wasn't a demon. It was a divine spirit gone mad long time ago. Her name is Eun"

"How did "her" end up inside of you?"

"That's... something I'd rather not talk about"

"Ok. Then, why are you here? From what I've heard about it, Fahrmann is very far away from here. Did your people exiled you because of this Eun?"

"No. I'm here because... I'm looking for my older brother, Aren"

The elf smirked.

"There's a small river out here. You should wash yourself" she said while walking out.

"Ah..."

Ara tried to say something, but the woman was already gone.

* * *

He was burying bodies for almost seven hours. He took off his shirt and wiped the sweat from his forehead. It was hot, that day, and digging into the ground was of no help.

He had already buried fourtysix bodies. There were still seven, and then he would have finished. It was then that Amelia called out to him.

"How are you doing?"

"I'm almost done here" he answered, letting go the shovel and resting a bit "Did she wake up?"

"Yes, she's washing herself in the river now"

"Did she told you anything?"

"Nothing I didn't insight, well, more or less. Except for one thing"

Elsword nodded, not really interested, and went back to digging.

"Well, look at the bright side"

He turned.

"Bright side? What goddamned bright side is there in what happened?!"

"Now you can go look for your sister without leaving someone behind, can't you?"

He didn't answer. That was true, he couldn't deny it, but...

"However, you should talk with her"

"Why?"

"You two share something"

"Really? And what would that be?" he asked, quite annoyed by that statement.

"You'll find out"

She stretched.

"However, I'll leave this place before the sun set"

"... what do you mean with "I"?"

"You know, I kind of miss traveling around alone. I'm not saying you're unpleasant to have around, it's just... I want to go back to the old times"

"Do whatever you want"

Silence fell upon them. When Elsword had finished, Amelia had already walked off to somewhere. Maybe she was still inside the village. Maybe not. He put his shirt on, and went to his house to get something to eat. There he found the elf woman, already munching some snacks.

"... and here I thought you were already gone..."

She said something, but since she was eating at the same time, Elsword couldn't understand a single word. He ate something, then went to his room. Amelia muttered something, but again he couldn't understand what she said. He went to sleep, taking off only his armor. He was tired.

It was night when he woke up. He opened his eyes, and found two amber eyes staring at him, so close he could see nothing them. He impulsively snapped, making the girl fall back. There were a few canldes lit here and there, probably her doing.

"Sorry! Sorry, really!"

"What..." Elsword got up "What were you doing?"

"Nothing, it's just... you resemble someone I met about three years ago"

"If you say so" he answered while walking to the kitchen. The girl followed him, and kept looking at him while he was eating some snacks.

"... do you want to tell me something?"

"Just... was that person a sibling of yours? I mean, there aren't many boys with red eyes and hair, let alone girls..."

"Wait... you mean the person you're talking about is a girl?"

"Yes, why?"

"Do you remember her name?"

"I didn't really talk with her, but... I think it was... Enesis, or something like that..."

Elsword grabbed the girl's shoulders.

"Where?! Where did you met her?!"

"H-hey, calm down, please!"

"Where?!"

"In the north, near Endroseil!"

"Endroseil? What was she doing there?"

"I don't know, we just met by chance in the forest. Really"

Elsword let go of the girl.

"Endroseil... that's past the war zone between Hamel and Velder... damn"

"Ehm... who was that girl?"

"My sister"

"..."

Ara looked down.

"Are you... looking for her?"

"Why do you ask?"

"I'm... I'm looking for my brother, too"

At that moment, Elsword remembered what Amelia told him.

_Is this what she meant?_

"Now that I think about it... did you see Amelia? The elf"

"She left a couple of hours ago"

"I knew it"

He sat on a chair, holding his head in his hands.

"Endroseil... how the hell do I get there without ending up in a battlefield?"

The girl looked at him.

There was a war going on between Hamel and Velder. It had started just recently, about three years ago, but there had already been thousands of victims. At first, it was fought on Hamel's territory, but ever since a commander of the Velder Kingdom, a certain Raven, betrayed, Hamel managed to bring his army near Feita. It was Hamel who started it, but noone really knew why.

"... I know a way to get there..."

"Really?!" Elsword almost jumped back on his feet.

"There... there is a road which cross the mountains and the forests. It's fallen into disuse a long time ago, but it's still accessible. Just, it's not that safe..."

"That's not a problem. Can you lead me?"

It was... almost fun. First this girl completely destroy his life, though it wasn't exactly her the one who did it, and now she gives him a trail which may lead him to his sister. It was fun, in a slightly sick way.

"Oh, I forgot... what's your name?"

"Ara Haan, from the village of Isshin"

"I'm Elsword Sieghart. So, can you lead me?"

"I... I don't think it's a good idea to travel with me..."

"Honestly, at this point I don't care"

"... what?"

Ara looked at him in amazement.

"Ok, let's say it another way. I don't know what your exact situation is, and I don't really want to know, but you can warn me when you're about to... I don't know... transform?"

_Is it even right "transform"? Ah, who cares... _Elsword thought.

"Y-yes, I think I can, but..."

"Ok, then it's settled!"

"..."

_Is something wrong with him...?_

* * *

**Author's notes**

**Well, this was short. Too much short, probably. I apologize. Well, it's also true that the first one was unusually long, at least for my standards.**

**Ara and Elsword probably won't appear in the next chapter, so expect someone else to be introduced.**

**Also, school will start the day after tomorrow, and I don't know how ofter I'll be able to write, so... well, you get the point.**


End file.
